San Lorenzo B Baby

My new area in San Lorenzo has been VERY different than my first area is Ballesteros. San Lorenzo is in the province of Illocos Norte which means that there's actually more normal American-like things here. By no means is it exactly like America, but it's cool to see that near our area we actually have the only mall in the entire mission. Also in our area there's some nicer homes and things sprinkled into our proselyting range. That is a huge change to my experience in Ballesteros. Having been in the more rural Cagayan province in Ballesteros, it has kind of been an adjustment to now have our apartment on the main highway in the Philippines that goes all the way to Manila. That being said, don't imagine this road being like the interstate in America because it still is just a two lane road but does have lots of traffic that keeps us up all night. 

Our apartment itself is actually a really big upgrade from that of Ballesteros. It is on the fourth floor of an auto glass shop and is really pretty nice. The major downfall of the apartment is that there is almost no water pressure since it's on the top floor. This means that we usually just let the faucet trickle all day and fill up buckets we use to shower and stuff. I hope we can talk to someone and get that fixed.

My new companion is named Elder Morely. He is 18 and from Sandy, Utah. He's actually one cycle behind me in the mission which means I've been out for about a month and a half longer than him. This means that I'm senior companion and both of us are not yet perfect in Tagalog. It's kind of funny when we teach people but we seem to manage and they seem to understand us. Anyways, it is nice because he also likes to work hard as well which is something I really liked about my old companion Elder Areola. Sometimes I think we get a little caught up in the letter of the law rather than spirit of the law when it comes to mission rules, but it's been good overall. 

Anyways, the area overall is pretty different, and the work here is slower than it was in Ballesteros, but the ward is great, the people are nice, and I am excited to get to work here and help spread the good news. 

Wednesday -

So I'm just going to start on Wednesday because all of Tuesday I basically just packed and prepared to leave Ballesteros. I ended up leaving Ballesteros on Wednesday morning and sat on a bus for 5 hours or so to Laoag. We ended up arriving at the Laoag stake center at around 4:00 and I was able to meet my new companion Elder Morely. Also, a member named Eric who speaks pretty good English compared to most people here, was also waiting to give us a ride to our area. I was also delightfully surprised to see that Elder Etcheverry, a member of my district in the MTC, just transferred to San Lorenzo A and is in my district.

Anyways, we headed to our apartment quick, I dropped off my bags, and then we went to the birthday party of the daughter of the bishop of our ward. It was cool to immediately get out into my area, meet a lot of people and members, and explore a little bit. My area now does have a lot more legit houses than in Ballesteros and also has lots of pretty cornfields all around which are also new to me. In Ballesteros we really only had rice fields (which are also cool though). 

Thursday -

The whole morning really consisted of getting situated, getting to know each other, and discussing the area, members, and people we're teaching. Though from a numbers scale, this isn't necessarily the most productive missionary work I think it was very helpful to get an idea of what the area is really like and to discuss who needs help.

During lunch, we headed out quick and ate at a "burger" stand because I didn't have any food in our apartment since I'm new. Before we left we were kind of debating whether or not we needed to bring our bags, but we both ended up getting a feeling that we needed to. Once we got to the burger stand, we ended up talking to the worker. She was very religious and we ended up having a very good discussion with her which we happened to need our bags for. We gave her a Book of Mormon and asked her if the missionaries in the area she lived could meet her sometime and she said yes. So it really seemed like a simple thing to not take our proselyting bags out for a quick lunch break but this experience is a pretty good testament to me to always be prepared and listen to the spirit when it gives you direction. We don't necessarily know what's going to happen to her with the other missionaries but one thing we did do was plant the seed. It's kinda unfortunate that she's not in our area and our investigator but the important thing is that she can be influenced by the gospel whether it's through us or the elders in the other area. 

The rest of the day mostly consisted of familiarization of our proselyting area for me. We just walked around and kind of visited members and the people we were teaching. By around 6:30 we headed over to the church for the homecoming of a missionary. I also on the spot got assigned to share a spiritual thought, which apparently happens to missionaries here in San Lorenzo pretty frequently.

Friday -

Most of the day was just scoping out more of our area. I just really wanted to get familiar with our areas, where we mostly teach, and how to find peoples houses. We also planned for like three lessons and no one ended up being available. I also really wanted to see some of the areas that Elder Morely isn't super familiar with either to see if they would have potential for teaching some time. We ended up going to this place called San Marcos (Payas) that he's only been to once in his three cycles here. We ended up finding an area with lots of friendly people and intend to go back at some point to do lots of finding for new people.

At the end of the day we headed over to a members house for a dinner appointment (which we apparently have a lot of here which was very unusual in Ballesteros). It was the home of the Barruga family. Tatay Barruga is the owner of a huge construction company here and they have a ridiculously huge house with a big staircase in the middle. It was so big and empty and felt unnecessarily large. It was basically one huge room and kind of felt warehousey. Anyways, there was tons of extended family as well along with their personal workers. Everyone seemed pretty nice though which is awesome.

Saturday - 

We usually use Saturdays to invite our current investigators to church. Our day mostly consisted of trying to contact and invite them. We also ended finishing introducing me to our entire area. It took a mere three days. We ended up teaching one legit lesson but no one else was available.. again.. On the bright side we ended up managing to unintentionally get three free tricey rides. We thought they were just going to be normal rides but the drivers at the end just told us we didn't have to pay which was really cool. We also ended up eating dinner at the home of the Ortega family. Their house is smaller than that of the Barruga family but it seems nicer. It was really nice and seemed kind of nicer than most American houses. This is definitely a rare exception around here but is pretty cool none the less. They have a legit security cameras and things all over their property as well.

Sunday - 

We went to church, did weekly planning that we forgot to do on Friday, and taught a single lesson to a recent convert and her sister that is not a member. Also, we were very concerned about our plan for dinner because our appointment had been cancelled earlier and we didn't really have food in the apartment so we ended up just saying a quick prayer for help and went out proselyting without a plan. An answer to our prayer came through the recent convert that we taught. They fed us from their own dinner that they had prepared after we taught them. It was really cool and a simple example of how you can really pray for anything. 

Pictures - 

our apartment and views from it, proselyting area, stuff

Some Last Pictures in Ballesteros

Notes from mom: Brodie, Elder Butler, and Elder Prusse all left Ballesteros yesterday for their new areas. They will be traveling on bus to Laoag and then they will part ways to their new areas. The members were sad to see them go. I had a few members in Ballesteros tell me that they will miss Elder Hunsaker. I will miss receiving bonus pictures and videos of my boy. Excited for these missionaries and their next adventures in the Philippines.

The morning they left Ballesteros with Rence San Juan (member that was recently called to serve a mission in another part of the Philippines)

Post that I got the picture from

Their last night in Ballesteros

Goodbye Ballesteros! Hello San Lorenzo!

This week has been pretty busy but mostly consisted of lots of service like unto last week. My last week here in Ballesteros has been pretty fun but I'm excited to have received the news that I'm moving on to my next area called San Lorenzo in Ilocos Norte. I'm also excited to meet my new companion Elder Morley. I don't really know much information about him, but I do know that I'm becoming the senior companion which I think means he's pretty new in the mission. This is moderately concerning considering I'm not sure how great my Tagalog is but I guess we'll see how this goes. That being said, I still am very excited for my new area, companion, and ward/branch.

Tuesday - 

So Tuesday consisted of two main parts. First of all, we had service all morning in my far area called Fugu. This was at the home of our investigator that had one of her feet amputated because of her diabetes. Our service consisted of pulling out lots of weeds and helping make a ramp up to their house that is more accessible for her wheelchair. It was pretty enjoyable and a lot of work seemed to get done. Once it was the afternoon Elder Butler and I headed back to Ballesteros Centro on exchanges in order to do some work in both of our areas. We first went to Elder Butler's area and taught a lesson to an investigator that didn't previously want to be baptized. The lesson really went pretty well and I was impressed by both the Tagalog of Elder Butler and my own Tagalog. At the end of the lesson this investigator actually decided that he wanted to be baptized. I don't think this is necessarily because of our specific lesson, but it was cool none the less that he changed his mind. 

After that, we headed into my area and taught a lesson about the Gift of the Holy Ghost to my recent convert. For some reason it did not go as well as the previous lesson and our Tagalog wasn't as great, but it was alright.

Wednesday -

We actually did some normal missionary work. We went to Fugu again and just taught to all our investigators there. Also, we did like a miniature service thing where we helped this nanay pump and carry some buckets of water up the hill. It was funny because she basically said "No don't let the white one carrry it or he'll get sick! It's too hard." This is kinda thing is funny but typical. They think because we're white and from America we have never done anything physically difficult in our entire lives, so instead of letting that belief remain I intentionally acted like I couldn't understand her Tagalog and then carried all the buckets myself. It was funny cause she didn't expect it. During that day we taught four pretty good lessons to our investigators.

Thursday - 

This whole day mostly consisted of service as well. We ended up just chopping a whole bunch of trees with machetes. We then used that wood in order to make charcoal. I think it's kinda funny how we haven't moved passed using machetes to something as simple as an ax to cut wood. It was an alright experience and my hands got super blistered, but it's okay because everyone here told me it's because I'm a "very hard worker." After that, we ate a pretty gross meal consisting of peppers, tomatoes, rice, and this weird mashed up vegetable that kinda looked like gruel. Of course, we ate it to avoid offending people. 

Once we got home we were greeted to some Dunkin' Donuts. We actually gave some money for donuts to a member who was traveling to the further bigger city called Tuguegarao. I was expecting a delicious delight, but we were greeted to below average donuts. I'm not sure if they're lower quality because they're Dunkin' Donuts of the Philippines, or if it was just the fact that Dunkin' Donuts is not Krispy Kreme. 

Friday -

The apartment was deep cleaned during the extra time we didn't use for weekly planning. We also went out and taught four lessons.

Saturday -

More service. We helped build up the destroyed roof of a guy who had a stroke and has only half of his body functioning. We also met a lady that had lived in Texas for 20 years and talked to her in English for a while which was cool. Later Elder Butler and Vaea had a baptism. The one baptism took four tries which was kinda funny. 

After that, we hung around the church because we were invited to get food from the district YSA Valentines Party. After that, on the way home we saw tons of people gathered. We ended up finding the biggest event and group of people gathered  that I've seen so far here in Ballesteros. We investigated and found a huge event that ended up just being a bakla pageant. It was literally just a huge competition for gay people and basically the whole community gathered to support and watch. It was very strange. 

Sunday -

We had to give our testimonies in our branch because they knew we are being transferred. Then we had missionary work. Then we had a kind of farewell party thing at the house of our friend and fellowshipper Renz San Juan.

Pictures - 

ramp making service, the sky, the cat that got stuck under our gate and screamed a whole bunch and tried to scratch us when we tried to help it, wood chopping service, coconuts, meal on palm leaves, Dunkin' Donuts, YSA Valentines dance, cows on basketball court, roof making service, valentines dance creep shot, bakla pageant, random picture